The new batteries can also be recharged hundreds of thousands of times say MIT researchers

You could be charging your long lasting batteries in a matter of seconds in the future if several researchers at MIT get their way. According to a report on ScienCentralNews, researchers at MIT have discovered a new way of making batteries that involves using millions of nanotubes. Leaping over traditional battery technologies, the new types of batteries are based on capacitors, which have been around even longer than the battery itself.

A capacitor maintains a charge by relying on two metallic electrodes. The actual storage capacity of a capacitor is directly proportional to the surface area of those electrodes, and unfortunately making a capacitor in traditional battery sizes means that the electrode surface area is simply too small. To overcome this, the researchers cover the electrodes with millions of nanotube filaments, effectively increasing the surface area.

According to research team leader Joel Schindall "[the nanotube battery] could be recharged many, many times perhaps hundreds of thousands of times, and ... it could be recharged very quickly, just in a matter of seconds rather than a matter of hours." With such promise, Schindall and his team believes that the new technology will revolutionize portable electronics as well as the automotive industry. "Larger devices such as automobiles where you could regeneratively re-use the energy of motion and therefore improve the energy efficiency and fuel economy."

The research team at MIT is hoping that this new promising technology will show up in the market in less than five years from now.

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oil is not just used for cars, and since the oil is running out anyway I doubt the oil companies would even have an interest in blocking this, au contraire, they should support it because oil prices can only raised so much until the global economy collapses which would hurt the oil companies just as much ...

LOL, the last thing "the oil companies" would do is buy it out and bury it. Given that more of these cars on the road would result in greater electricity consumption - which is primarily dependent on coal and oil - they still win.

Also, we are not running out of oil, our production is simply not meeting demand. We find more and more recoverable oil deposits every month, more than we can probably ever use, but until we pump it out and refine it, it doesn't do us much good. So long as we don't cripple the oil industry with this "windfall" tax BS, they can use their profits for more exploration.

It would actually result in lower oil and coal consumption, as electronic vehicles do not use oil and the electricity can be procured from anywhere, including coal and oil plants that have much greater efficiency than any type of car engine on the market.